We saw The Kingdom last night. Having read the one sentence synopsis on IMDB it wasn’t what I was expecting. If I had seen the trailer or looked at the official website I might have been expecting something closer to what I saw. Even then, it was quite “sobering” (was the word my husband used) for a mainstream movie.
It was good to see some familiar faces; Chris Cooper, Jennifer Garner, Jeremy Piven, Kyle Chandler, Peter Berg.
The basic story line is: when an American compound in Saudi Arabia is bombed, four FBI special agents go to SA, without permission from US authorities. They are told by the Saudis that they can investigate the bombings but encounter a lot of political stonewalling. Until they boldly convince the prince of SA to let them help to find the criminal responsible.
Once they’re in the thick of it there’s a lot of action, shooting, bombing, bazookas, blood. It’s not a typical action movie though, it’s quite thought provoking. They even had a montage of the Saudi police officers going home to their families to look after them and pray with them; perhaps to make sure that we know not all muslims want to kill ‘the infidels’.
Jeremy Piven had a classic line: “Boobies, can we dial down the boobies? We need to dial these things down.” (Referring to Jennifer Garner’s character when they were about to receive a visit from the prince of Saudi Arabia.)
Overall I thought it was an enjoyable, thought provoking, action satisfying movie. The last lines of the movie were a little disturbing, I’ll let you find out for yourself… I can’t help wondering if people really feel that way.
